The Carbuncle Doll
by AzureKate
Summary: Vanille meets Prompto, and the two become friends right off the bat. But when Fang gets jealous and the two end up going head to head, Vanille's group and Prompto's group end up clashing in the Chocobo Corral! Vanille x Prompto


Vanille skipped along walkway, offering 'excuse me's to groups she passed through or people she bumped. New Nautilus was everything she hoped it would be. It was almost exactly the same as the original city of dreams—it had the same mood, the same technology, the same happy faces, and everything. Vanille felt happy in the city. Fang was off who knows where playing who knows what game trying to win who knows what big toy. Fang had promised she would win Vanille something before they had to leave, and had run off to do so. Sazh was with Dajh; Lightning and Hope were off riding rides; and, of course Serah and Snow were probably sitting on a bench somewhere snuggling—or maybe Snow was trying to win her something, too. Vanille was ultimately left alone; but she didn't mind. She didn't have very many chances to go around on her own and do what she wanted without having to worry about what the others wanted to do. So, the solitude—from the group, anyway—was nice.

Vanille saw a stand with a game, with carbuncle dolls as the prize. Vanille definitely adored carbuncle. Immediately sucked in by the doll's cuteness, she quickly went over to the stand, reaching in her pouch for some money to play. She figured she wouldn't win but the doll was so cute she had to try! She walked up to the stand and stood just behind a group of men; there were four of them. Only one was playing the game, a blond man with a black vest and pants with boots that were lined with fur, just like hers! The other three guys looked quite annoyed. One was in all black, standing against the stand beside the blond man with his arms crossed and his eyes closed; one had on formal-looking clothes and his hair stood straight up; the third man had a mullet, a tattooed arm, and an open shirt allowing his well-toned muscles to be seen. The two brunettes seemed to be more annoyed than the raven-haired man.

"Come on," the well-dressed man complained. "This is your sixth game. You are not going to win the doll."

"Mark my words, I will get it," the blonde replied, his voice overflowing with determination. Vanille smiled and held her money close, waiting quietly since the black-haired man was standing in the only other open spot at the stand. The muscular tattooed man noticed her and nudged him, and he looked at her. He moved so that the second spot was open. She smiled at him and walked up to the stand.

"Don't count on winning," the well-dressed man said, this time addressing Vanille. She looked at him. "The game is rigged. He's been going at it for twenty minutes and still hasn't won."

"I know…but the dolls are so cute, I thought I'd try anyway!" she replied.

"What a waste of money," the black-haired man scoffed. Vanille ignored him and handed the guy behind the stand her money. He handed her three balls and told her to bounce them off a tilted trampoline into a bucket. She tossed the first ball, and totally missed. She watched as the blonde guy missed the bucket, too, and sighed. He quickly pulled out more money from his pocket and the man gave him three more balls.

"We are wasting our time!" the muscular man exclaimed. "Come on, you don't need to play seven games of this!"

"Go on without me, I'll catch up!" the blonde guy replied, annoyed. The other three seemed to hesitate for a moment before turning and leaving, disappearing into the crowd. The blonde smirked and looked at Vanille with a crooked smile. "I didn't think they'd actually leave."

"You gonna go catch up now?" she tossed her second ball and missed again.

"Nah. All their complaining was annoying me, anyway. They won't go too far without me." He missed again. "Dang, this game is hard. See, now, if this was a shooting game I'd have already won."

"There isn't really anything I'm good at," Vanille said with a giggle. "I came here with my friends and my best friend is off somewhere trying to win me a prize, too. I'll never win one on my own. But these carbuncle dolls are adorable!"

"They are pretty cute."

Vanille tossed her final ball and hit the rim of the bucket, but just missed. She sighed with sadness. "Well, no point in trying again, but it was worth a shot. Bye-bye!"

"Oh, hey, wait up!" he called, tossing his three balls without looking and missing on all three. He jumped a few steps to catch up with Vanille, who looked at him. "What's your name, anyway?"

"I'm Vanille," she replied.

"Pretty name. I'm Prompto."

"Nice to meet you!" Vanille said cheerily. She caught sight of Lightning and Hope in the distance. Hope was leading her to another ride with an excited look on his face. Even from the distance Vanille could tell that Lightning was smiling. That meant this trip was a good idea! "Oh, there's some of my friends!"

Prompto followed her eye to Lightning and Hope just as they disappeared into the crowd. "You gonna go with them?"

"Nah, they look like they're having fun."

Prompto chuckled and said, "Etro knows were _my_ friends went! They're probably off in some dark little corner being boring—Oh! Oh!"

Prompto darted off to the side toward another game stand and Vanille followed him. It was a bb gun game with little moving targets. The prize: a big carbuncle doll!

"Oh…I got this one!" Prompto said excitedly as he handed the woman in the stand some money and picked up one of the guns. "I _so_ got this."

Vanille laughed. "I would try but I'm not good with a gun at all."

"Oh, I _am."_

And at that, in just a few seconds, Prompto took out all six of the moving targets without missing a shot, not even the tiny fast target. The woman running the stand was wide-eyed at his skill. With her jaw hanging, she reached up and unhooked the big carbuncle doll from the stand wall and handed it to Prompto, who held it up in triumph.

"Good job, you're really good at that!" Vanille said happily.

"Eh, what can I say? I'm a sharpshooter." He winked at her. And then, after looking at the doll for a moment, he held it out to Vanille with a smile on his face.

"What? For me?" Vanille asked, surprised. He nodded and she slowly took the big green stuffed doll from his hands. "Why? You just spent so long at that other stand trying to get one."

"Yeah, but you seem to like the doll more than I do. And what will I do with something like that anyway? My friends will just whine and nag about it and complain that it's in their way."

Vanille hugged the doll. "Thanks so much Prompto! I love it."

"Glad to hear it!"

Suddenly, Vanille heard someone calling for her. "Vanille!" She turned around and saw Fang running toward her, holding a tiny cait sith in her arm. "I got you…a doll…"

Fang locked eyes on the big carbuncle doll and Prompto beside her.

"This is my new friend Prompto," Vanille introduced. "He gave me his carbuncle doll!"

"But I just spend two hours trying to win you something…!" Fang said, sounding hurt.

"Aww, don't feel bad, Fang. I love cait sith, too!" Vanille said, taking the smaller doll from Fang's hand and hugging the two dolls close. "They're both adorable!"

Fang locked eyes with Prompto and her eyes narrowed threateningly. Prompto seemed to catch on quickly and returned the poisonous glare. After a few seconds, Fang challenged, "I bet you I can win her something bigger than that green rabbit."

"It's a carbuncle, and you're on," Prompto replied. They continued to stare at each other for a moment more, and then both of them took off into the city to try and win something bigger for Vanille, who just stared in surprise. She ran off after them.

"Wait, guys! It's okay, you don't have to compete, I love them both! Hey, guys! Wait up!"

She chased after them for what felt like forever. They stopped at every booth with a big animal but never played the game more than once. Neither of them won anything in their rush to win the biggest. When they finally reached the Chocobo Corral, they slowed and started glaring at each other again. Vanille had just managed to catch up, trying to catch her breath.

She gasped when Fang tackled Prompto to the grass.

Grunting and groaning, the two started to wrestle. Fang grabbed Prompto's hair and pulled and he tried to get her off of him. Vanille, panicking and unsure what to do, cried, "Stop it! Stop!" A crowd had begun to gather, cheering on the wrestling match that was unfolding in the middle of the Corral. The chocobos had scattered and were squawking at Prompto, Fang, and the growing crowd, some flapping their wings.

As the wrestling match was just about to get worse, two pairs of muscular arms reached in and grabbed the two of them, pulling them apart and lifting them to their feet. Snow and Prompto's muscular friend had wandered into the Corral to see what the commotion was. Snow had a firm grip on Fang's arms—Serah was off in the crowd, watching—while Prompto's friend was having no problem keeping the thin blonde in place. Vanille saw that his two other friends were in the crowd not too far away from Serah.

"C'mere, you little punk!" Fang taunted, trying to escape from Snow's grasp. "Lemme go!"

"And what are _you_ doing?" Prompto's friend demanded. "We leave you alone for twenty minutes, and we find you wrestling with some lady in the Chocobo Corral! Really, Prompto?"

"Hey, _she_ jumped _me!" _he cried.

"Fang!" Snow said sternly. "We came to New Nautilus to have fun, not to fight with some weirdos."

"Weirdos?" Prompto's friend demanded. He and Snow locked eyes, and everyone felt instant tension between them. Snow shoved Fang away and the other man shoved Prompto away—who fell—and the two took a few big steps and got in each others faces. "Why don't you take that back?"

"Why don't you make me?" Snow taunted.

"Snow!" Serah said from the crowd. Prompto's other friends stepped forward.

Responding to Snow's taunt, Prompto's friend grabbed Snow and Snow grabbed him, and the two engaged in a test of strength. The crowd began cheering them on, instead. The two groaned and grunted as they tried to overpower the other—the were equally matched, however, and getting nowhere.

"Gladiolus!" Prompto's well-dressed friend scolded. "Come on, Noctis is getting impatient."

"Just a second," Gladiolus grunted, still trying to overpower Snow.

"Now, Gladiolus."

"Chill, Ignis, I got this!"

And then the two muscular giants were ripped apart from each other and swords clashed. Vanille gasped, clutching the carbuncle doll tight. Lightning had her gunblade drawn and Prompto's black haired friend had a fancy-looking sword of his own, presumably Noctis. Not to mention quite a few other deadly-looking weapons that were somehow hovering around him. Both were staring at each other with cold eyes.

"You look like someone capable of higher-level thinking," Lightning said, her muscles stiff.

"As do you," Noctis replied.

"Let's go our separate ways and pretend this never happened. I'll take my idiots, and you take yours," Lightning offered.

"You read my mind."

Lightning collapsed her gunblade and slid it back into its holster, and all of Noctis' weapons disappeared. Lightning turned away and stared shoving Snow and Fang in the opposite direction, while Noctis simply glared at his own companions and they quickly went the other way. All except for Prompto, who went over to Vanille and picked up her cait sith doll, which she had dropped in all the commotion.

"I'm really sorry about all that," Prompto said. "But she really did jump me first."

"Yeah I know, I saw," Vanille said.

Ignis saw Prompto wasn't following and called from the distance, "Prompto!"

"Hey you wanna meet up somewhere sometime?" Prompto asked.

"I'd love to!" Vanille agreed. "Where do you want to meet?"

"Vanille, let's go!" Snow called.

"I dunno, what's a good place? We're not from around here. We're here at the city hotel throughout the weekend."

"_Prompto!"_

"_Vanille!"_

"Oh, so are we."

"Wanna just meet up here tomorrow then?"

"Sounds good."

"At two? We can ride rides or somethin."

"I'll be there!"

"Great, it's a date."

Noctis suddenly teleported between the two. _"Go."_

Prompto quickly turned and dashed the other way away from the irritated Noctis, who teleported away. Fang came over to Vanille and grabbed her arm, proceeding to drag her away. "Ow! Hey!"

"Come on, we're going back to the hotel," Fang said, staring in the direction Prompto had run with hateful eyes. "You aren't keeping that green doll, are you?"

"Of course I am!" Vanille cried.

Fang rolled her eyes and pulled Vanille back toward the group; everyone was waiting for them. But Vanille kept watching Prompto until she couldn't see him anymore. What a sweet guy he was!

Vanille definitely had something great to look forward to the next day!


End file.
